An architect like the French Consul is on his guard against a financial, social and moral danger of this sort. He is aware that, in a well-organized society, there must be neither surcharge nor discharge, no favors, no exemptions and no exclusions. Moreover, "l'Etat c'est lui;"[3210] thus is the public interest confounded with his personal interest, and, in the management of this double interest, his hands are free. Proprietor; and first inhabitant of France in the fashion of its former kings, he is not obliged and embarrassed as they were by immemorial precedents, by the concessions they have sanctioned or the rights they have acquired. At the public table over which he presides and which is his table, he does not, like Louis XV. or Louis XVI., encounter messmates already installed there, the heirs or purchasers of the seats they occupy,[3211] extending in long rows from one end of the room to the other, each in his place according to rank, in an arm-chair, or common chair, or on a footstool, all being the legitimate and recognized owners of their seats, all of them the King's messmates and all authorized by law, tradition and custom to eat a free dinner or pay for it at less than cost, to find fault with the dishes passed around, to reach out for those not near by, to help themselves to what they want and to carry off the dessert in their pockets. At the new table there are no places secured beforehand. It is Napoleon himself who arranges the table, and on sitting down, he is the master who has invited whomsoever he pleases, who assigns to each his portion, who regulates meals as he thinks best for his own and the common interest, and who introduces into the entire service order, watchfulness and economy. Instead of a prodigal and negligent grand-seignior, here at last is a modern administrator who orders supplies, distributes portions and limits consumption, a contractor who feels his responsibility, a man of business able to calculate. Henceforth, each is to pay for his portion, estimated according to his ration, and each is to enjoy his ration according to his quota.—Judge of this by one example: In his own house, customarily a center of abuses and sinecures, there must be no more parasites. From the grooms and scullions of his palace up to its grand officials, even to the chamberlains and ladies of honor, all his domestics, with or without titles, work and perform their daily tasks in person, administrative or decorative, day or night, at the appointed time, for exact compensation, without pickings or stealing and without waste. His train and his parades, as pompous as under the old monarchy, admit of the same ordinary and extraordinary expenses—stables, chapel, food, hunts, journeys, private theatricals, renewals of plate and furniture, and the maintenance of twelve palaces or châteaux. While, under Louis XV., it was estimated that "coffee with one roll for each lady of honor cost the King 2,000 livres a year," and under Louis XVI.," the grand broth night and day" which Madame Royale, aged two years, sometimes drank and which figured in the annual accounts at 5201 livres,[3212] under Napoleon "in the pantries, in the kitchens, the smallest dish, a mere plate of soup, a glass of sugared water, would not have been served without the authorization or check of grand-marshal Duroc. Every abuse is watched; the gains of each are calculated and regulated beforehand."[3213] Consequently, this or that journey to Fontainebleau which had cost Louis XVI. nearly 2 million livres, cost Napoleon, with the same series of fêtes, only 150,000 francs, while the total expense of his civil household, instead of amounting to 25 million livres, remains under 3 million francs.[3214] The pomp is thus equal, but the expense is ten times less; the new master is able to derive a tenfold return from persons and money, because he squeezes the full value out of every man he employs and every crown he spends. Nobody has surpassed him in the art of turning money and men to account, and he is as shrewd, as careful, as sharp in procuring them as he is in profiting by them.
II. Equitable Taxation.
The apportionment of charges.—New fiscal principle and new
fiscal machinery.
In the assignment of public burdens and of public offices Napoleon therefore applies the maxims of the new system of rights, and his practice is in conformity with the theory. For the social order, which, according to the philosophers, is the only just one in itself, is at the same time the most profitable for him: he adds equity because equity is profitable to him.—And first, in the matter of public burdens, there shall be no more exemptions. To relieve any category of taxpayers or of conscripts from taxation or from military service would annually impoverish the treasury by so many millions of crowns, and diminish the army by so many thousands of soldiers. Napoleon is not the man to deprive himself without reason of either a soldier or a franc; above all things, he wants his army complete and his treasury full; to supply their deficits he seizes whatever he can lay his hands on, both taxable material as well as recruitable material. But all material is limited; if he took too little on the one hand he would be obliged to take too much on the other; it is impossible to relieve these without oppressing those, and oppression, especially in the matter of taxation, is what, in 1789, excited the universal jacquerie, perverted the Revolution, and broke France to pieces.—At present, in the matter of taxation, distributive justice lays down a universal and fixed law; whatever the property may be, large or small, and of whatever kind or form, whether lands, buildings, indebtedness, ready money, profits, incomes or salaries, it is the State which, through its laws, tribunals, police, gendarmes and army, preserves it from ever ready aggression within and without; the State guarantees, procures and ensures the enjoyment of it. Consequently, property of every species owes the State its premium of assurance, so many centimes on the franc. The quality, the fortune, the age or the sex of the owner is of little importance; each franc assured, no matter in whose hands, must pay the same number of centimes, not one too much, not one too little.—Such is the new principle. To announce it is easy enough; all that is necessary is to combine speculative ideas, and any Academy can do that. The National Assembly of 1789 had proclaimed it with the rattling of drums, but merely as a right and with no practical effect. Napoleon turns it into a reality, and henceforth the ideal rule is applied as strictly as is possible with human material, thanks to two pieces of fiscal machinery of a new type, superior of their kind, and which, compared with those of the ancient Régime, or with those of the Revolution, are masterpieces.
III. Formation of Honest, Efficient Tax Collectors
Direct real and personal taxation.—In what respect the new
machinery is superior to the old.—Full and quick returns.—
Relief to taxpayers.—Greater relief to the poor workman and
small farmer.
The collection of a direct tax is a surgical operation performed on the taxpayer, one which removes a piece of his substance: he suffers on account of this and submits to it only because he is obliged to. If the operation is performed on him by other hands he submits to it willingly or not. But that he should do it himself, spontaneously and with his own hands, it is not to be thought of. On the other hand, the collection of a direct tax according to the prescriptions of distributive justice, is a subjection of each taxpayer to an amputation proportionate to his bulk or, at least, to his surface; this requires delicate calculation and is not to be entrusted to the patients themselves, for, not only are they surgical novices and poor calculators, but, again, they are interested in calculating falsely. They have been ordered to assess their group with a certain total weight of human substance, and to apportion to each individual in their group the lighter or heavier portion he must provide. Everyone will soon understand that, the more that is cut from the others, the less will be required of him. And as each is more sensitive to his own suffering, although moderate, than to another's suffering, even excessive, each, therefore, be his neighbor little or big, is inclined, in order to unjustly diminish his own sacrifice by an ounce, to add a pound unjustly to that of his neighbor.
Up to this time, in the construction of the fiscal machine, nobody knew or had been disposed to take into account such natural and powerful sentiments; through negligence or through optimism, the taxpayer had been introduced into the mechanism in the quality of first agent; before 1789, in the quality of a responsible and constrained agent; after 1789, in the quality of a voluntary and philanthropic agent. Hence, before 1789, the machine had proved mischievous, and after 1789, impotent; before 1789, its working had been almost fatal,[3215] and after 1789 its returns scarcely amounted to anything.[3216] Finally, Napoleon establishes independent, special and competent operators, enlightened by local informers, but withdrawn from local influences. These are appointed, paid and supported by the central government, forced to act impartially by the appeal of the taxpayer to the council of the prefecture, and forced to keep correct accounts by the final auditing of a special court (cour des comptes). The are kept interested, through the security they have given as well as by commissions, in the integral recovery of unpaid arrears and in the prompt returns of collected taxes. All, assessors, auditors, directors, inspectors and collectors, being good accountants, are watched by good accountants, kept to their duties by fear, and made aware that embezzlements, lucrative under the Directory,[3217] are punished under the Consulate.[3218] They are soon led to consider necessity a virtue, to pride themselves inwardly on compulsory rectitude, to imagine that they have a conscience and hence to acquiring one, in short, to voluntarily imposing on themselves probity and exactitude through amour-propre and honorable scruples.—For the first time in ten years lists of taxes are prepared and their collection begun at the beginning of the year.[3219] Previous to 1789, the taxpayer was always in arrears, while the treasury received only three-fifths of that which was due in the current year.[3220] After 1800, direct taxes are nearly always fully returned before the end of the current year, and half a century later, the taxpayers, instead of being in arrears, are often in advance.[3221] To do this work required, before 1789, about 200,000 collectors, besides the administrative corps,[3222] occupied one half of their time for two successive years in running from door to door, miserable and detested, ruined by their ruinous office, fleecers and the fleeced, and always escorted by bailiffs and constables. Since 1800, from five thousand to six thousand collectors, and other fiscal agents, honorable and respected, have only to do their office-work at home and make regular rounds on given days, in order to collect more than double the amount without any vexation and using very little constraint. Before 1780, direct taxation brought in about 170 millions;[3223] after the year XI, it brought in 360 millions.[3224] By the same measure, an extraordinary counter-measure, the taxable party, especially the peasant-proprietor, the small farmer with nobody to protect him, diametrically opposite to the privileged class, the drudge of the monarchy, is relieved of three-fourths of his immemorial burden.[3225] At first, through the abolition of tithes and of feudal privileges, he gets back one-quarter of his net income, that quarter which he paid to the seignior and to the clergy; next, through the application of direct taxation to all lands and to all persons, his quota is reduced one-half. Before 1789, he paid, on 100 francs net income, 14 to the seignior, 14 to the clergy, 53 to the State, and kept only 18 or 19 for himself. After 1800, he pays nothing out of 100 francs of income to the seignior or to the clergy; he pays but little to the State, only 21 francs to the commune and department, and keeps 79 francs in his pocket.[3226]